Demonstration: Villagers protest shifting of power supply

The protesters blocked Faisalabad-Chiniot Road for a couple of hours, causing inconvenience to vehicular traffic. They also chanted slogans against the Faisalabad Electric Supply Company (FESCO) and demanded that their electricity connections be shifted back to the Industrial Line feeder.

They said that the shifting had been carried out in violation of a court directive. Anticipating the move, some protesters had obtained a restraining order against it, they said. They added that a contempt of court petition would be moved against the FESCO if their demands were not met.

 Speaking to The Express Tribune, Abdul Haq, a Bahaduriwala resident, said that since 1985 the FESCO had been supplying electricity to his village in Rajoa area from the Faisalabad Industrial Line. He said that he was unable to understand the reason for suddenly shifting the connections from the industrial line to a different feeder.

Some protesters said that they feared that the shifting of electricity connections to a different feeder could affect water supply to their villages. Water supply to the villages would decline if the number of hours of power outages went up, they said.

Most protesters said that they belonged to Bahaduriwala, Lonay and Khichian villages.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 12^th, 2016.